A caffeine-fueled engineer’s quest to put every Pittsburgh coffee shop on the map

With more than 140 cafes scattered across its many neighborhoods, Pittsburgh has earned its ranking as one of the nation’s top coffee cities. 

Now, one local software engineer wants to put it on the map. 

Spun out of a passion for quality coffee, and ambitions to connect Pittsburgh’s coffee community, John-George Sample, a front-end software engineer for the education company Niche by day, launched pgh.coffee in November 2023. The interactive map of coffee shops in Allegheny County attempts to document every cafe in the region.

“I realized that this had legs beyond my own use,” Sample told Techncial.ly. “I am a software engineer, so the obvious choice is to make this a website.” 

By Sample’s estimates, he’s about 90% done adding all the current coffee shops in Allegheny County. 

The project began as an informal spreadsheet in the summer of 2023 when Sample challenged himself to visit every coffee shop in Pittsburgh, he said. After sharing the spreadsheet with coworkers, Sample realized many great coffee shops were going unnoticed.

The website recently attracted attention after he promoted it on Pittsburgh reddit and a local tech Slack channel, he said, boosting the site’s unique visitors from 40 to over 4,000 in just a few days and garnering positive feedback plus suggestions for improvement. 

Open source fuels big indie projects like pgh.coffee

Sample launched a basic version of the project through GitHub, a platform that allows developers to create, store, manage and share code. Since then, Sample has added new features to the site, including an interactive map and additional coffee shop locations beyond city limits. 

The open-source community helped him develop more difficult parts of the project. For example, he used an open-source map library to develop the interactive main page of the site that’s more user friendly.  

“It felt important to me to do this as open source work because that is what has helped software get to the point it is,” Sample said. “I’m standing on the shoulders of giants … and it just feels good to give back to that community.”  

GitHub reported having over 100 million developers and at least 28 million public repositories last year. Companies and independent developers are turning to open-source software because it is more cost-efficient, accelerates the project process and comes with built-in community support, according to a survey of more than 2,000 developers by Statista.

Regional coffee maps have popped up over time in other parts of the country, too. Steven Palomino, an app developer based in Kansas, said he developed a similar project called Closest Cup nearly a decade ago. 

The app helped him and his friends find local coffee shops while traveling and is still available to download today. 

His advice to Sample? Projects like these can greatly benefit from user submissions and feedback, Palomino said.

That’s already happening on pgh.coffee. Building community will be a big part of forthcoming developments on pgh.coffee, Sample said. He plans to add user accounts over the next six months, allowing Pittsburgh’s coffee community to track their visits, leave reviews and connect with other users. 

The website already offers users an opportunity to leave Sample direct feedback and submit new coffee shop locations.

Coffee shop owners say the tech could be good for business, too

Sample’s website is already catching the attention of prominent figures in the Pittsburgh coffee scene. 

One new visitor to pgh.coffee since its recent boom is TJ Fairchild, owner of Commonplace Coffee, a business with locations in Squirrel Hill, Garfield, Southside Works, Rockwell Park and the Mexican War Streets. 

Coffee drinkers and shop owners are finding ways to connect but “it could always be better,” he said. That’s where pgh.coffee is filling a gap. 

“There’s a host of little reasons why a smaller or newer shop isn’t known that could easily be answered by storytelling like this,” said Fairchild, who also organizes Pittsburgh Coffee Week, an annual series of coffee-themed community events to connect professionals and enthusiasts.

Local coffee shop owners already see opportunities to partner with pgh.coffee to connect with new customers. The website could benefit new coffee shops trying to connect with customers while balancing small advertising budgets, said Ashley Comer, owner of Carnegie Coffee Company in Carnegie.

“I can’t tell you, in the last 11 years, how many coffee houses I’ve seen open and close immediately, within the span of nine months to a year,” Comer said. “I feel like some sort of mentorship program could be useful because most people when they do this, it’s a passion project, and they have no idea what they’re doing.” 

Small businesses in Pittsburgh come and go every year. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately 20% of new businesses in Pennsylvania fail during their first two years. 

All four locations of the local chain Adda Coffee & Tea House abruptly shut down earlier this year after workers attempted to unionize. In a Facebook announcement made in January, the coffee house said it had been operating at a loss since it first opened eight years ago. 

Sample said he is interested in potential partnerships with coffee shops to offer promotions through the website. But for now, it’s just a passion project sparked by coffee’s close link to the tech workforce. 

“There is a long-time bond between software development and caffeine,” Sample said. “It is a good, conducive work environment where you can meet people. I do get a kick when I see someone else programming at a coffee shop.”